SWARMY WEATHER: Bees turn a fire hydrant on Fulton Street into a temporary home. The number of legal hives has soared since 2010. Photo: Kristy Leibowitz

SWARMY WEATHER: Bees turn a fire hydrant on Fulton Street into a temporary home. The number of legal hives has soared since 2010. (
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First they landed in the Bowery, then went after a family in Hell’s Kitchen. They stopped traffic in The Bronx and sent tourists scrambling at the South Street Seaport.

New York City’s honeybees are swarming so much, they’ve become a fright fit for horror movies.

“It hasn’t even started yet,” said Anthony Planakis, the police officer who for 18 years has been charged with removing the hair-raising clusters. “Within the next week, we’re going to be bombarded again.”

This spring, Planakis has been called to 30 swarms, as clouds of bees choose buildings, light poles and fire hydrants as their temporary homes.

Experts say the city’s obsession with rooftop beekeeping will only bring more apiary emergencies.

“Everybody and their mother says they’re a fourth-generation beekeeper,” Planakis said. “But [bees] can be dangerous if you don’t know how to handle them.”

There are now 161 hives registered with the city Health Department, compared to just three in 2010 — the year beekeeping was legalized.

Colonies are buzzing atop hundreds of homes and tony hotels, including the Waldorf-Astoria and the InterContinental Barclay.

In Brooklyn, the Navy Yard just created the biggest habitat with 20 hives and 20 million bees.

“The hives, and the swarms, have grown exponentially,” said Andrew Coté, founder of the New York City Beekeepers Association. “And the longer they hang on a stop sign or playground, the worse it is for legalized beekeeping.”

Last month, Planakis removed four pounds of bees from a tree on the Bowery and rescued a family when 10,000 honeybees ganged up on their SUV at Pier 92. Then, on Memorial Day weekend, 17,000 bees stormed a fire hydrant in front of Red restaurant at the Seaport.

“It was a nightmare,” said manager Happy Miller. “It looked like a million bees flying over Fulton Street. Tourists were screaming.”

Coté and Planakis were called to more than a dozen swarms last week alone.

Bees swarm instinctively as part of their annual life cycle — or when a hive is suffering from disease, neglect or overcrowding.

“Preventing bees from swarming is like preventing teenagers from having sex,” said Tim O’Neal of Borough Bees. “You can say, ‘Hey, this is a bad idea’ . . . but ultimately it’s up to the bees.”

A swarm flies up to 200 yards away, then sends foragers to find a new home — a process that could take hours or days. The bees are at their most docile, having no young, no comb, nothing to defend unless they’re provoked. For apiarists, it means free bees.

“Whenever I find a swarm in an odd location, I take it out with my bare hands,” O’Neal said.

Coté, who helped the department lift the ban on bees, is now pushing the agency to license beekeepers and to limit the number of colonies.

Last week, police arrested a well-known apiarist in Bedford-Stuyvesant after he left his bees in a hot car — while teaching a beekeeping class. The insects gnawed their way out of their plastic casing and engulfed the sidewalk.

“There are too many hives right now,” Coté said. “As it increases in popularity, it will be more and more difficult to control.”